Harvard’s Decades-Long Expansion Dream Meets Harsh Real Estate Reality
A biotech downturn and pulled federal funds have stymied the university’s property bet in Boston’s Allston neighborhood — while nearby MIT has thrived.
Harvard's new Enterprise Research Campus in the Boston neighborhood of Allston, in December.
Photographer: Tony LuongDuring his time as Harvard University’s president, Larry Summers outlined a bold plan to create an epicenter for scientific research befitting of the school’s prestigious stature.
Harvard had little room for growth in Cambridge, its home since the 1600s. But just across the Charles River sat Allston, a working-class Boston neighborhood where the university had assembled hundreds of acres of land. There, Summers envisioned developing a sort of Silicon Valley of the East — a worthy competitor to California’s Stanford University and the nearby Massachusetts Institute of Technology for high-tech innovation.